After a Heart-to-Heart, Melbourne City keeps their season alive with win over Wellington.

After a midweek Heart-to-Heart with his squad, Aurelio Vidmar says that an improved mindset partnered an improved performance in his side's much-needed 1-0 win over Wellington.

Melbourne City desperately needed that. 

Winless in their last five games, the longest such run in five years, and five points back of the top six, Saturday evening’s clash with Wellington Phoenix loomed as a contest that would make or break their season. Backs to the wall and all that. It’s not what we’ve been accustomed to associating with them in recent times, but given that they’re staring down the barrel of missing finals for the first time since they were called Melbourne Heart, unfamiliar narratives seem to be following this City side around at the moment. 

Samuel Souprayen being the one to give them their 1-0 win via a 58th minute after a short corner routine was somewhat novel as well, given that it was the Frenchman’s first-ever goal in a City shirt. You could clearly see what gaining the ascendency against the league leaders meant to the team, as well, with Tolgay Arslan, whose cross onto the head of Souprayen was genuinely pinpoint, and Vicente Fernández sprinted towards the City dugout after their little coordinated move set the goal up to celebrate with assistant coach Scott Jamieson as the rest of the team celebrated around the defender.

And while that set piece would prove their lone goal of the evening, it wasn’t created in a vacuum, City fashioning plenty of opportunities to add to that tally throughout the evening. When the final whistle sounded, they had recorded 27 shots in the preceding exchanges (eight one target), an expected goals tally of 2.13, and, importantly against a Nix side that prides itself on denying their opponents quality chances even if there’s a quantity of them, five 'big chances' missed. 

“The mindset was completely different,” Vidmar said. “We had nothing to lose and we went for it, that's what we did – part of what the City Group DNA is and that's the way we had to play.”

Conversely, Kosta Barbarouses’ 81st-minute miss when he was played in one-on-one with Jamie Young was notable in not only being a golden opportunity to equalise late on spurned but also the only properly gilt-edged the visitors had fashioned. 

A team built on absorbing pressure and hitting in transition, the Kiwis frequently found themselves frustrated throughout the evening by Souprayen – who was playing on his more natural left side with Curtis Good rotated – and Nuno Reis when they did look to get in behind. Numbers were thrown forward late but City, even with Steven Ugarkovic forced into a right-back role with Callum Talbot and Fernández out on their feet, held firm.

"The positive was that we didn't give up and we threw everything at them," coach Giancarlo Italiano said.

"At the same time, this is a good lesson for us that if we play like that now for the rest of the season, that's not going to be enough for us to go where we want to go and get the points that we need.”

At this point, City fans might be wondering where performances like tonight have been all season. It wasn’t anywhere near as close to the poleaxing pain inflicted by City sides in years past but, especially against a top-of-the-table foe, it was a lot better than a great number of the other performances they’ve dished up this season. 

It was just last week that this side was plodding to a 2-0 defeat at the hands of Macarthur, a game that Vidmar had highlighted as being pivotal in its own right, only for his side to look second best in most meaningful measures when the game was on the line. A few weeks before that they were getting beaten 4-2 by Perth Glory and 5-1 by Brisbane Roar – neither side in the top six. 

“I'm very proud of the players because we had a mental shift during the week and a big discussion about it,” he said. “[Tonight] is one game, really pleased about it and now we have to see if we can back up.”

“I opened up [in that discussion] about how it should be, what my beliefs are and the values of doing justice to the City Group in terms of the DNA of the football that's being played here. That's what we did tonight and that's how it should be. 

“They've had a history, especially over the last four or five years that they've been doing that and we haven't met those expectations at all, certainly for the last six to eight weeks. But tonight was a good start again, where it should be

“When you go through a little bit of a trough and the wins aren't coming, certainly the intent and the effort was there and it was something like tonight that you just needed to take that step over that line. 

“Everything sort of went to plan for us tonight and it was extremely difficult conditions but they dug in and when it got difficult, they continued to find something extra and that's what you need to do if you want to be successful.”

Of course, getting back to themes of unfamiliarity, there was one notable variation in this City side tonight. It wasn’t Jamie Maclaren leading the line, in what was ostensibly a must-win game against a high-flying Phoenix that is renowned for being tough to break down, but, instead, Max Caputo. 

And Caputo played well, too, coming close on numerous occasions in the first half to opening the scoring and giving his opponents a different, and challenging, opponent with his big frame. Still just 18 years old, the teenager certainly did little to dissuade notions that he’s an exciting prospect for the future and, even if it’s likely Maclaren will come into the side for Tuesday’s clash with Western Sydney, it won’t be because Caputo didn’t show enough on Saturday. 

“I don't like to use that word [dropped],” said Vidmar. “But we're in constant dialogue. We spoke a couple of weeks ago about maybe just taking a little bit of pressure off [him]; starting on the bench and coming on during the course of the game. In the end, I decided against it. 

“But I thought now was the right time. He's had a pretty big period of being on top of his game and, unfortunately, right now he's not. It's not through a lack of trying. Just when you're trying to bang your head against the wall, the wall's not gonna break down - that's where he's at the moment. 

“But he came on, gave us some energy in the second half and he was offside with that shot towards the end. Slowly, slowly he should start to get a little bit more confidence.”

Now, the Wanderers will visit City on Tuesday. A win over Marko Rudan’s side would move them back into the top six and put the wind at their backs heading into the international break. Mat Leckie, maybe, will be back. Maybe he won’t. Vidmar doesn’t have a clear timeline one way or the other. He was supposed to be back for Wellington but continues to be plagued by various maladies. Wanderers skipper Marcelo won’t be there after he picked up a yellow-card suspension in their loss to Western United.

“It's a big game,” said Vidmar. “I think we've had a couple of moments during the course of the season -- two months ago where we had those crunch games -- that we didn't deliver and now it's another one of those.”